Dear Mother Jones Reader,
On Friday, a catastrophic 7.7-magnitude earthquake struck Myanmar. It is the strongest and most devastating earthquake that has been recorded in the country for years. More than 2,700 lives have been lost, and over 4,500 are injured. Hospitals are overwhelmed, and critical infrastructure has been destroyed. Medical teams are doing everything they can, but they are working under extreme conditions.
My colleague in Mandalay shared the heartbreaking reality with me: “The situation is chaotic. The city has been cut off from the rest of the country with widespread power cuts, and the main access routes are severely damaged. A disaster of this scale is extremely traumatic. Most of the victims have lost everything they had.”
Despite the challenges – no electricity or phones, highways completely destroyed, and cuts to USAID, which would typically support an emergency response like this – our teams are already on the ground.
|